In this episode, I’m joined by Priyamvada Gopal, Professor of Postcolonial Studies at the University of Cambridge and author of Insurgent Empire: Anticolonial Resistance and British Dissent (Verso, 2019), to discuss the complicated and often fraught politics of decolonization. We explore how the idea of ‘decolonization’ has evolved over time, the many and often contradictory meanings that this term has taken on, and what a truly radical and liberatory politics of decolonization might look like in our present moment.

Return to Bandung is hosted by Pranay Somayajula, an Indian-American writer, researcher, and organizer based in Washington, D.C. His work explores themes of diaspora, (inter)nationalism, anticolonial politics, and the many lives and afterlives of empire. You can learn more about Pranay and read his writing on his website, as well as on his Substack blog, culture shock.

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Sources and helpful links:

• Priyamvada Gopal — Insurgent Empire: Anticolonial Resistance and British Dissent (Verso, 2019)

• Pranay Somayajula — Decolonization and its Discontents (Monthly Review, May 2025)

• Jan C. Jansen and Jürgen Osterhammel — Decolonization: A Short History (Princeton University Press, 2017)

• Priyamvada Gopal — Empire and its Enemies (interview with Jamhoor, August 2022)

• Kira Huju — How ‘decolonial Hindutva’ marries nativist politics with left-wing vocabulary (Scroll, April 2024)

• Mike Gonzalez — José Carlos Mariátegui Was the Great Pioneer of Latin American Marxism (Jacobin, February 2023)

• Eve Tuck and K. Wayne Yang — Decolonization is Not a Metaphor (Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society, 2012)

• Pranay Somayajula — We Are All Palestinians: Notes on Solidarity and Collective Resistance (culture shock, June 2024)

• Priyamvada Gopal — On Decolonisation and the University (Textual Practice, May 2021)

• Frantz Fanon — The Wretched of the Earth (Grove Press, 1963)

Social links:

Return to Bandung:

• Twitter: ⁠twitter.com/returntobandung⁠

• Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/returntobandung/⁠

Pranay Somayajula:

• Twitter: ⁠https://twitter.com/p_somayajula⁠

• Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/pranay.somayajula/⁠

• Website: ⁠https://www.pranaysomayajula.com/⁠

• Substack: ⁠https://www.culture-shock.xyz/⁠

Priyamvada Gopal

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/priyamvadagopal